Issey Miyake

Issey Miyake (1938–2022) was a Japanese designer whose work explored the relationship between cloth, the body and movement. After studying and working in Paris and New York, he established Miyake Design Studio in 1970 and began showing collections internationally.

His experiments with pleating led to Pleats Please, announced as a brand in 1993. A-POC developed a further approach to making clothing from a continuous piece of fabric. Miyake also worked across dance, exhibitions and photography, including a sustained collaboration with Irving Penn and costumes for William Forsythe's Ballett Frankfurt. He helped establish Tokyo's 21_21 Design Sight, extending his interest in design beyond seasonal clothing into exhibitions, research and public discussion.